The etymology is uncertain, but the word seems to have originated from the conjunction of the two Latin words conserere (meaning to tie, to join, to weave) and certamen (competition, fight): the idea is that the two parts in a concerto, the soloist and the orchestra, alternate episodes of opposition, cooperation, and independence in the creation of the music flow.

The concerto, as understood in this modern way, arose in the Baroque period side by side with the concerto grosso, which contrasted a small group of instruments with the rest of the orchestra. The popularity of the concerto grosso form declined after the Baroque period, and the genre was not revived until the 20th century. The solo concerto, however, has remained a vital musical force from its inception to this day.

Early Baroque concerto

The term “concerto” was initially used to denote works involving voices and instruments in which the instruments had independent parts—as opposed to the Renaissance common practice in which the instruments that accompanied voices only doubled the voice parts.[1] Examples of this earlier form of concerto include Giovanni Gabrieli‘s “In Ecclesiis” or Heinrich Schütz‘s “Saul, Saul, was verfolgst du mich.”

Late Baroque concerto

The concerto began to take its modern shape in the late Baroque period. Starting from a form called Concerto grosso popularized by Arcangelo Corelli, it evolved into the form we understand today as performance of a soloist with/against an orchestra.

During the baroque period, before the invention of the piano, keyboard concertos were comparatively rare, with the exception of the organ and some harpsichord concertos by Johann Sebastian Bach. As the harpsichord evolved into the fortepiano, and in the end to the modern piano, the increased volume and the richer sound of the new instrument allowed the keyboard instrument to better compete with a full orchestra.

Classical concerto

Sonata form in the Classical Concerto. See: trill (music), cadenza, and coda (music). For exposition, development and recapitulation, see sonata form.The concerti of the sons of Johann Sebastian Bach are perhaps the best links between those of the Baroque period and those of the Classical era.

It is conventional to state that the first movements of concerti from the Classical period onwards follow the structure of sonata form. Final movements are often in rondo form, as in J.S. Bach’s E Major Violin Concerto.

Violin concertos

Mozart wrote five violin concerti, in quick succession. They show a number of influences, notably Italian and Austrian. Several passages have leanings towards folk music, as manifested in Austrian serenades.

Cello concertos

Haydn wrote at least two cello concertos which are the most important works in that genre of the classical era. However, C.P.E. Bach’s three cello concertos are also noteworthy.

Keyboard concertos

C.P.E. Bach’s keyboard concertos contain some brilliant soloistic writing. Some of them have movements that run into one another without a break, and there are frequent cross-movement thematic references.

Mozart, as a boy, made arrangements for harpsichord and orchestra of three sonata movements by Johann Christian Bach. By the time he was twenty, Mozart was able to write concerto ritornelli that gave the orchestra admirable opportunity for asserting its character in an exposition with some five or six sharply contrasted themes, before the soloist enters to elaborate on the material. Some of his twenty-seven piano are considered central in the instrument’s repertoire.

Haydn wrote a dozen keyboard concertos, although a couple of them are considered spurious.

Romantic concerto

Violin concertos

In the 19th century the concerto as a vehicle for virtuosic display flourished as never before. It was the age in which the artist was seen as hero, to be worshipped and adulated with rapture. Early Romantic traits can be found in the violin concertos of Viotti, but it is Spohr’s twelve violin concertos, written between 1802 and 1827, that truly embrace the Romantic spirit with their melodic as well as their dramatic qualities.

Mendelssohn opens his violin concerto (1844) with the singing qualities of the violin solo. Even later passage work is dramatic and recitative-like, rather than merely virtuosic. The wind instruments state the lyrical second subject over a low pedal G on the violin – certainly[neutrality is disputed] an innovation. The cadenza, placed at the end of the development and acting as a link to the recapitulation, is fully written out and integrated into the structure.

The great violin virtuoso Niccolò Paganini was a legendary figure who, as a composer, exploited the technical potential of his instrument to its very limits. Each one exploits rhapsodic ideas but is unique in its own form. The Belgian violinist Henri Vieuxtemps, himself a major virtuoso, contributed several works to this form.

Max Bruch wrote three violin concertos, but it is the first, in G minor, that has remained a firm favorite in the repertoire. The opening movement relates so closely to the two remaining movements that it functions like an operatic prelude.

In the same year Brahms wrote his violin concerto for the virtuoso Joseph Joachim. This work makes new demands on the player, so much so that when it was first written it was referred to as a “concerto against the violin”. The first movement brings the concerto into the realm of symphonic development. The second movement is traditionally lyrical, and the finale is based on a lively Hungarian theme.

Elgar‘s popular concerto, while written in the early 20th century, belongs to the late romantic period stylistically.

Today’s ‘core’ repertoire which is performed the most of any cello concertos are by Elgar, Dvořák, Saint-Saëns, Haydn, Shostakovich and Schumann, but there are many more concertos which are performed nearly as often (see below: cello concertos in the 20th century).

Piano concertos

Beethoven’s five piano concertos increase the technical demands made on the soloist. The last two are particularly remarkable, integrating the concerto into a large symphonic structure with movements that frequently run into one another. His Piano Concerto No. 4 starts, against tradition, with a statement by the piano, after which the orchestra magically enters in a foreign key, to present what would normally have been the opening tutti. The work has an essentially lyrical character. The slow movement is a dramatic dialogue between the soloist and the orchestra. His Piano Concerto No. 5 has the basic rhythm of a Viennese military march. There is no lyrical second subject, but in its place a continuous development of the opening material. He also wrote a Triple Concerto for piano, violin, cello, and orchestra.

Chopin wrote two piano concertos in which the orchestra is very much relegated to an accompanying role. Schumann, despite being a pianist-composer, wrote a piano concerto in which virtuosity is never allowed to eclipse the essential lyrical quality of the work. The gentle, expressive melody heard at the beginning on woodwind and horns (after the piano’s heralding introductory chords) bears the material for most of the argument in the first movement. In fact, argument in the traditional developmental sense is replaced by a kind of variation technique in which soloist and orchestra interweave their ideas.

Liszt‘s mastery of piano technique matched that of Paganini for the violin. His concertos No. 1 and No. 2 left a deep impression on the style of piano concerto writing, influencing Rubinstein, and especially Tchaikovsky, whose first piano concerto’s rich chordal opening is justly famous. Grieg’s concerto likewise begins in a striking manner after which it continues in a lyrical vein.

Brahms‘s First Piano Concerto in D minor (pub 1861) was the result of an immense amount of work on a mass of material originally intended for a symphony. His Second Piano Concerto in B♭ major (1881) has four movements and is written on a larger scale than any earlier concerto. Like his violin concerto, it is symphonic in proportions.

Fewer piano concertos were written in the late Romantic Period. But Grieg-inspired Sergei Rachmaninoff wrote 4 piano concertos between 1891 and 1926. His 2nd and 3rd, being the most popular of the 4, went on to become among the most famous in piano repertoire and shining examples of Russian musicianship.

Small-scale works

Besides the usual three-movement works with the title “concerto”, many 19th-century composers wrote shorter pieces for solo instrument and orchestra, often bearing descriptive titles. From around 1800 such pieces were often called Konzertstück or Phantasie by German composers.

These changes also affected the concerto as a musical form. Beside more or less radical effects on musical language, they led to a redefinition of the concept of virtuosity in order to include new and extended instrumental techniques as well as a focus on aspects of sound that had been neglected or even ignored before such as pitch, timbre and dynamics. In some cases, they also brought about a new approach to the role of the soloist and its relation to the orchestra.

Violin concertos

Two great innovators of early 20th-century music, Schoenberg and Stravinsky, both wrote violin concertos. The material in Schoenberg’s concerto, like that in Berg’s, is linked by the twelve-tone serial method. Bartók, another major 20th-century composer, wrote two important concertos for violin. Russian composers Prokofiev and Shostakovich both wrote two concertos while Khachaturian wrote a concerto and a Concerto-Rhapsody for the instrument. Hindemith’s concertos hark back to the forms of the 19th century, even if the harmonic language which he used was different.

Three violin concertos from David Diamond show the form in neoclassical style.

More recently, Dutilleux‘s L’Arbre des Songes has proved an important addition to the repertoire and a fine example of the composer’s atonal yet melodic style.

Cello concertos

In the 20th century, particularly after the Second World War, the cello enjoyed an unprecedented popularity. As a result, its concertante repertoire caught up with those of the piano and the violin both in terms of quantity and quality.

Béla Bartók also wrote three piano concertos. Like their violin counterparts, they show the various stages in his musical development.

Ralph Vaughan Williams wrote a concerto for piano (in fact a reworking of a concerto for two pianos – both versions have been recorded) while Benjamin Britten‘s concerto for piano (1938) is a fine work from his early period.

György Ligeti‘s concerto (1988) has a synthetic quality: it mixes complex rhythms, the composer’s Hungarian roots and his experiments with micropolyphony from the 1960s and 70’s.[3]Witold Lutoslawski‘s piano concerto, completed in the same year, alternates between playfulness and mystery. It also displays a partial return to melody after the composer’s aleatoric period.[4]

Concertos for other instruments

The 20th century also witnessed a growth of the concertante repertoire of instruments, some of which had seldom or never been used in this capacity. As a result, almost all classical instruments now have a concertante repertoire. Examples include:

Concertos for orchestra or concert band

In the 20th and 21st centuries, several composers wrote concertos for orchestra or concert band. In these works, different sections and/or instruments of the orchestra or concert band are treated at one point or another as soloists with emphasis on solo sections and/or instruments changing during the piece. Some examples include those written by:

Concertos for two or more instruments

Many composers also wrote concertos for two or more soloists.

In the Baroque era:

Vivaldi‘s concerti for 2, 3 or 4 violins, for 2 cellos, for 2 mandolins, for 2 trumpets, for 2 flutes, for oboe and bassoon, for cello and bassoon… etc.. Some of Vivaldi’s concerti were written for a very large number of soloists, including the extraordinary RV555 which features 3 violins, an oboe, 2 recorders, 2 viole all’inglese, a chalumeau, 2 cellos, 2 harpsichords and 2 trumpets.

Jean Françaix‘s concerto for two pianos and another for two harps, as well as his Divertissement for string trio and orchestra, his Quadruple Concerto for flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon and orchestra, his Double Concerto for flute and clarinet, and his Concerto for 15 Soloists and Orchestra

Bohuslav Martinu‘s concerto for string quartet, concertino for piano trio and string orchestra, two concertante duos for two violins, concerto for two pianos, sinfonia concertante No. 2 for violin, cello, oboe, bassoon and orchestra with piano, and his concerto for violin and piano.

Concertino

A concertino (or Konzertstück) is a short concerto freer in form. It normally takes the form of a one-movementmusical composition for solo instrument and orchestra, though some concertinos are written in several movements played without a pause.Some notable concertinosListed by composer: